Hydra (Earth-1600)
Hydra is a criminal organization led by the Red Skull. History Foundation Hydra has its roots in the special weapons division of the Nazi Sturmabteilung. Led by Ernst Kaufmann, the division was charged with developing advanced weapons for the German army. In June 1934, during the Night of the Long Knives, Kaufmann was killed by the SS officer Johann Schmidt. Schmidt and his men eliminated Kaufmann's entire unit, except one man, Dr. Arnim Zola. Schmidt took over Kaufmann's weapons program and formed his own SS division, naming it Hydra. Hydra was named after the mythological creature and used its original phrase: "cut off one head, two more will take its place". It was soon charged with science experiments and deep investigation of the occult. Due to contributions from Arnim Zola, Hydra developed several extremely advanced weapons. World War II Rebirth After the War After the end of WWII, the United States started Operation Paperclip, a program that recruited Nazi scientists for employment by the United States and deny their scientific expertise and knowledge to the Soviet Union. As part of the operation, Zola was recruited into S.H.I.E.L.D., the newly formed peacekeeping organization. Various HYDRA operatives who escaped justice after World War II infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. shortly after the agency was formed, working secretly in their ranks. Over the next decades, led by Zola, HYDRA worked from the shadows, directing their agents to complete the tasks that were assigned. Toward the New World Order Shortly after the war, Arnim Zola found Sergeant James Barnes, Captain America's war-time partner who was presumed deceased after falling to an icy death toward the end of the war. Zola and other scientists took Barnes to one of HYDRA's secret bases, presumably in the territory held by the Soviet Union, where they replaced his lost left arm with the new cybernetic limb. They brainwashed him, and since he was already injected with another version of the Super-Soldier Serum, they turned him into the new fist of HYDRA. Though he was wearing the communist red star on his new limb, Barnes never fought for the Soviet ideals, instead becoming HYDRA's best assassin known as the Winter Soldier. Over the next decades, he did much on creating chaos in the world, assassinating those who could pose a threat to HYDRA's goals, and spending time between missions in cryogenic sleep. With S.H.I.E.L.D.'s resources, Zola managed to build an entire computer system which his mind was uploaded into as an artificially intelligent user interface. Though Zola's body died in 1972, his mind continued to live in cyberspace, from which he was able to provide easy passage into the agency for more HYDRA sleeper agents. Hydras was also fed with blueprints of technology created by various scientific organizations by sleeper agents of Hydra in order to create new weapons. Many organizations that these sleeper agents were in included Stark Industries, Oscorp, and Trask Industries, among many others. S.H.I.E.L.D. Civil War With new funds granted by the World Security Council, Nick Fury started Project Insight, an operation which involved three heavily armed Helicarriers that were designed to proactively strike out against potential threats before they actually happened. However, HYDRA's agents used this opportunity to take control of the project. With Arnim Zola's special algorithm that could calculate who could be a threat to HYDRA in the future, the leader of HYDRA's S.H.I.E.L.D. branch, Alexander Pierce, intended to wipe out 20 million people from the face of the Earth. The end of S.H.I.E.L.D. The HYDRA infiltration was finally exposed when Pierce attempted to activate Project Insight early. The operation was thwarted by the combined efforts of Captain America, Black Widow, Falcon, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Allen, Duma, Nick Fury and Maria Hill but the event left S.H.I.E.L.D. in shambles and resulted in the deaths of many HYDRA agents. Category:Earth-1600 Category:Villains Category:Organizations Category:Scientists Category:Avengers' Rogues Gallery (Earth-1600) Category:Spider-Man's Rogues Gallery (Earth-1600) Category:X-Men's Rogues Gallery (Earth-1600) Category:Created by Lord Caesar Category:Hydra (Earth-1600) Category:Villains of Earth-1600 Category:Captain America's Rogues Gallery (Earth-1600) Category:Terrorists